Media, mites, metafore en die kommunikasie van apartheid

Abstract

SUMMARY In this article it is argued that in spite of politicians and the media's efforts to create a new South Africa, they still mainly communicate in the discourse of apartheid. In order to reach and persuade their publics they use metaphors which embody existing stereotypes and myths of apartheid. The nature of metaphor, myth and stereotype, and the dilemma with which it confronts the media in its daily reporting of South African realities, are briefly discussed. The above is set within the context of a sociological and political theory of language, namely that interpretations of reality within a specific language community is set within the nature of the language as such, and that a language cannot be separated from ideology. In this article the emphasis is on Afrikaans.